Did George Washington have a prayer journal?

Answer 1

Yes, George Washington did have a Prayer Journal. Skeptics, sometimes called "scholars", challenge the "Daily Sacrifice" journal yet in the 1890's when first discovered, the auction house had two penmanship experts evaluate it as the penmanship of George Washington.
Sadly, too often college scholars have an Atheist or Agnostic worldview, so their minds are closed to the possibility of George Washington being a devout Christian Prayer Warrior.

When I first received the Daily Sacrifice from an "antique Bible" dealer and scholar, Dr. Rusty Maisel, the first thing I did was to be a "skeptic" myself, because I knew that is how so called scholars would respond. I took it to a local antiquities expert in Alexandria, Virginia who evaluates letters for Mount Vernon that are claimed to be George Washington's penmanship. He said to me in 1995 or so, "Yes this is an example of the handwriting of Washington at that age." In 2005, at my request he wrote a letter stating the same that is on the back cover of my Prayer Warrior Washington book available from Lulu.com, or at www.PrayerWarrior.US.

Skeptics say that the box received from a distant Washington Family member, with a different surname, in which the Prayer Journal was found was first given to the Smithsonian to take anything of value. The argument of the skeptics is "IF the Smithsonian did not value it as Washington's penmanship, then it is fake."

Several logical errors derive from the Skeptics argument. First, many boxes were left with the Smithsonian, and there is NO inventory of the contents that I have received in my communications with the Smithsonian. The Prayer Journal could have been easily overlooked, especially if buried ten or twenty layers down in a box of old papers.

Any auction house MUST inventory items, for usually they are auctioned piece by piece. Sometimes they are auctioned by lots. Once inventoried, an item of especial interest is found, it is due diligence to get an accurate assessment of its value, so the penmanship experts of the 1890s were called in. Historians or College Scholars are not often also Penmanship experts, so their opinions are no more valuable than the average man.

Further the scholars will say, "The Papers of George Washington" do not include the Prayer Journal. First the first volume of the Papers of George Washington is from AFTER this time period. About the same time I met with the staff for lunch in November a.d. 2008, did I see that the GW Papers Project editors have assigned an individual to begin to create a "Volume Zero" on the boyhood and early manhood writings of George Washington.

Volume one does not include the letter of George Washington to "Dear Dickie", Richard Henry Lee, from about age 11 either.

Most "Rules of Civility" books ignore other parts of GW's school boy notebooks, his "Practice of Law" by transcribing 28 legal documents and two wonderful Christian poems.

So there are some facts for folks to consider. Just because someone has a Ph.D. behind their name does not mean they are a source of accurate history. Some wags say Ph.D. is an abbreviation for Piled Higher and Deeper.

Yet kidding aside, remember that George Washington did not attend college at ALL. Yet a Harvard Professor Albert Bushnell Hart said Washington was the BEST educated of the Founding Fathers. (I can explain why if you wish.) And America's Educator, Noah Webster, said much the same, only in more powerful words. (I can provide them if you wish.)

I pray you come to believe as George Washington did, that it is wise to pray to Jesus as Lord.

James Renwick Manship, Sr.
aka The Spirit of George Washington LIVES!
Box 76, Mount Vernon, Virginia 22121